NWSL Season Preview 2023: 1 major question for each team
By Oliver Hunt
For the Washington Spirit: Will their strategy be to only play offense?
The Washington Spirit are going through a rebuilding period. They’ve faced a lot in the past few seasons, with the Yates report fully detailing the abuse from Richie Burke and Kris Ward. They appear to be striving for stability by re-hiring Mark Parsons as their head coach, who led the club to playoff games back at the beginning of the league.
The Spirit have also overhauled their roster this offseason, seemingly trading experience for youth. They had six draft picks this year, and used them to draft five attackers and one goalkeeper. They also recently signed Chloe Ricketts, making her the youngest player to sign with an NWSL club. They have only added one defender to their roster this off-season, Gabrielle Carle of the Canada WNT.
While this could be a new chapter for the spirit, they have a surprising lack of defenders on their squad at the moment, especially with the news of Anna Heilferty being out on a season-ending injury this year. They traded away Emily Sonnett, lost Kelley O’Hara to Gotham, and Karina Rodriguez to Club America. While they kept a few defensive staples in Amber Brooks and Sam Staab, this is still a very young squad in a period of transition. They will be looking to leaders like Andi Sullivan and Tori Huster to get them through this season, hopefully leading them to a better finish than second to last.